IRA BERKOW was a sports columnist and feature writer for The New York Times for 26 years, from March of 1981 to his retirement from the paper on Feb.1, 2007. He shared the Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting in 2001 with his article, "The Minority Quarterback," later published in "The Minority Quarterback and Other Lives in Sports," a collection of his feature stories for The Times. Ira is the author of 18 books, His book for the musical, "A Chicago Story – From Daley to Daley," is scheduled to premiere in Chicago May 1, 2009.

He has been a guest on such television shows as Face the Nation, Nightline, The Lehrer Report, Charlie Rose, Larry King Live and The Sports Reporters.

His magazine articles have appeared in Esquire, The New York Times Magazine, Art News, Seventeen, Chicago Magazine, The Chicago Tribune Magazine, National Strategic Forum Review, Readers' Digest and Sports Illustrated, among others.